"There!" he shouted, "That's the bitter winepress that I'm treading. This is my bitter path but tread it I will. I only wish the swine that sent them was underneath my feet. I would serve him in like fashion, whoever he may be. There that'll be something for ye to clean up something to keep your mind off the men you jade. A bit of scrubbin' will take the itch out of ye," and as he spoke he scattered the residue upon the floor with short kicks into every corner of the room. Seizing her by the shoulders, he shoved his face into hers and sneered coarsely,
"I understand what you're up to, my bonnie tottie, but don't go too far ye know what happened to ye the last time." As he concluded he flung her from him, sending her reeling against the wall, from where, with a blush of humiliation upon her face, she still looked at him in silence. After a moment he turned to Nessie and, in a completely opposite voice, soft, fond, wheedling, rendered deliberately contrasting to his tone to Mary in order to wound her the more, remarked:
"Come on, hinny pay no attention to what you've seen or to her either. Ye don't even need to speak to her in future if you don't want to. This sort of thing does not concern you, and besides, it's time you and me had our dauner down the road together we'll have you late for the school if we don't hurry up, and that would never do." He took Nessie's hand and with a great demonstration of affection, led her timid form from the room, but not before she had flashed one frightened, guilty glance at Mary as she turned to go out into the hall.
When the front door closed behind them Mary sighed. She pulled herself up from where Brodie had thrown her against the wall, and although she gazed sorrowfully at the dirty, scattered remnants of the fruit which Nessie would now never eat, she felt with some relief, despite her own humiliation, that her sister had not been prejudiced by the recent unfortunate incident. The words which her father had hurled at her shamed her almost beyond endurance, whilst the injustice of his attitude made her bury her teeth into her lip to keep back the hot rush of indignant tears. Although she had no evidence but that of her own intuition, she knew that Doctor Renwick in his kindness had sent her these grapes and indeed the other gifts, and now all the fine feelings of gratitude that she had entertained towards him, all her sacrifice for Nessie's sake, had been degraded,
thrust down into the mud by her father's gross interpretation of them. She had been made to feel again her position in the eyes of the world, reminded miserably of the smirch that lay upon her name, which would cling to her in this town as long as her life endured.
With a faint shiver she bestirred herself and began to clear the table of its dishes and, when she had caried them into the scullery, she set herself slowly to wash and dry them. As she worked she directed her mind deliberately from her own position, considering with some return of comfort that Nessie seemed to be improving slightly in health, that although her long and forced periods of study continued, she was eating better, that her thin cheeks showed some signs of filling out. Nothing was too much for her to endure if she could protect her sister make her well and strong. It was a supreme satisfaction to have been able to procure some better clothing for Nessie from her savings the small stock of money that she had brought home to Levenford and she cheered herself with the
thought of the improved appearance of the child from the neglected state in which she had found her upon her return.
When she had dried and put away the last dish she took a bucket of warm water and a cloth into the kitchen, went down upon her knees, and began to wash the floor. While she was thus engaged she was suddenly confronted by a whimsical vision of Renwick's face could he have observed her in her present occupation and perceived thus the grotesque result of his generosity. She did not, however, smile at her thought, but sighed again, considering that she would be obliged to ask him to discontinue these good-hearted offerings towards Nessie and herself. She had seen him on two occasions since her first visit to his house and on each she had felt more forcibly how compassionate he had been to interest himself so deeply on Nessie's behalf; but somehow, she had begun to shrink from meeting him, to dread the onset of that strange feeling which swept over her whenever she felt his dark, sympathetic eyes upon hers.
The remembrance of her father's recent words now came to her suddenly, and even in her solitude within the room she winced, wondering unhappily what indeed was the nature of her regard for this man who had shown her nothing but kindness and friendship. It was a happy circumstance perhaps that he was soon to leave the town, that the uncertain and troubled state of her mind would soon be ended.
Strange, then, that as she considered this happy circumstance her face should cloud so sadly, that as she finished her washing of the floor and sat down at the table to busy herself on some mending for Nessie her thoughts should refuse to leave him. He had told her to make her life a gallery of pictures, but her gallery contained now but one picture and that was the portrait of his face. The kitchen, once so dirty and untidy - now lay about her clean and spotless; the rest of the house was equally immaculate; her main work was finished for the day; and yet, when she should have taken up a book or engaged herself in some diversion, as he had directed, she could only sit and think of him. It was incredible!
True, her opportunities for relaxation were not unlimited for, although her return had caused no apparent ripple upon the surface of the life of the town, she shunned the public gaze and lately had formed the habit of going out only when the dusk had fallen. Only once had she departed from this custom, when she had made a pilgrimage to Darroch to see the grave that enclosed Denis and her child.
The same train had borne her, the same streets echoed to her sad, returning footsteps, but another name now stretched upon the signboard of the Lomond Vaults and the doctor whom she had consulted on diat last, unhappy visit had answered the call of his destiny and vanished, likewise into some unknown obscurity. No bitter passion of grief had moved her as she stood by the grave that lay on the slope of Darroch Hill, but only a tender melancholy, directed chiefly towards the form of her infant child that lay so near her kneeling body and was yet so inseparably divided from it. How strange, she had thought, that the throbbing body of the child that had lived so vigorously within her womb, should now lie buried in earth, detached from her for ever. Strange, too, that she, the mother, had never seen and now could never see that child. She had been still unconscious in the Cottage Hospital when, from exposure and its too early advent, it had died without her knowing without her seeing it.
A sense of the injustice of the infant's death had oppressed her as she rose to her feet and made her way out of the graveyard, feeling that she deserved her punishment and accepting it, but thinking that her child had surely merited some short happiness of life. As she got into the train at the station upon her homeward journey she had felt that this visit was final she would never return to that grave and as the train steamed out of the station she had, through the cloud of her depression, faintly visioned upon the platform an illusive figure the figure of Denis waving her a brave, encouraging and a last good-bye.
Now, as she sat at her sewing with a downward, pensive gaze, it was not the memory of this good-bye which filled her mind, but the anticipation of another, a less visionary parting, and in the privacy of her own intimate thoughts she admitted to herself at last, abandoning her attempts at self-delusion that it was hard for her to contemplate the departure of Doctor Renwick from the town. She knew well the gulf that separated them, bridged only by his charity, but conscious that her desire did not extend even to the presumption of friendship but merely to a longing for his presence near her, she felt it permissible for her to mourn his going. Levenford would be empty for her then!